Thursday, April 6, 2017

A counsel assisting the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has taken aim at several former Newcastle Anglican bishops, concluding one was "weak and ineffectual on child sexual abuse".

In its Newcastle and Sydney hearings in 2016, the royal commission heard claims of paedophile networks and cover ups during its probe into Newcastle's Anglican Diocese.

The royal commission today published the written submissions for the public hearings into the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle.

In her submission, counsel assisting the royal commission, Naomi Sharp, made nearly 150 observations known as 'available findings' in the report.

She said when former bishops Alfred Holland and Richard Appleby were able to ignore disclosures of allegations of sexual abuse, they chose to do so.